The Sea of Monsters

with us before resuming his quest for Pan. His bosses at the Council of Cloven Elders were so impressed that he hadn’t gotten himself killed and had cleared the way for future searchers, that they granted him a two-month furlough and a new set of reed pipes. The only bad news: Grover insisted on playing those pipes all afternoon long, and his musical skills hadn’t improved much. He played “YMCA,” and the strawberry plants started going crazy, wrapping around our feet like they were trying to strangle us. I guess I couldn’t blame them.
    Grover told me he could dissolve the empathy link between us, now that we were face to face, but I told him I’d just assume keep it if that was okay with him. He put down his reeds pipes and stared at me. “But, if I get in trouble again, you’ll be in danger, Percy! You could die!”
    “If you get in trouble again, I want to know about it. And I’ll come help you again, G-man. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
    In the end he agreed not to break the link. He went back to playing “YMCA” for the strawberry plants. I didn’t need an empathy link with the plants to know how they felt about it.
    Later on during archery class, Chiron pulled me aside and told me he’d fixed my problems with Meriwether Prep. The school no longer blamed me for destroying their gymnasium. The police were no longer looking for me.
    “How did you manage that?” I asked.
    Chiron’s eyes twinkled. “I merely suggested that the mortals had seen something different on that day—a furnace explosion that was not your fault.”
    “You just said that and they bought it?”
    “I manipulated the Mist. Some day, when you’re ready, I’ll show how it’s done.”
    “You mean, I can go back to Meriwether next year?”
    Chiron raised his eyebrows. “Oh, no, they’ve still expelled you. Your headmaster, Mr. Bonsai, said you had— how did he put it?—un-groovy karma that disrupted the school’s educational aura. But you’re not in any legal trouble, which was a relief to your mother. Oh, and speaking of your mother . . .”
    He unclipped his cell phone from his quiver and handed it to me. “It’s high time you called her.”
    The worst part was the beginning—the “Percy-Jacksonwhat-were-you-thinking-do-you-have-any-idea-howworried-I-was-sneaking-off-to-camp-without-permissiongoing-on-dangerous-quests-and-scaring-me-half-to-death” part.
    But finally she paused to catch her breath. “Oh, I’m just glad you’re safe!”
    That’s the great thing about my mom. She’s no good at staying angry. She tries, but it just isn’t in her nature.
    “I’m sorry, Mom,” I told her. “I won’t scare you again.”
    “Don’t promise me that, Percy. You know very well it will only get worse.” She tried to sound casual about it, but I could tell she was pretty shaken up.
    I wanted to say something to make her feel better, but I knew she was right. Being a half-blood, I would always be doing things that scared her. And as I got older, the dangers would just get greater.
    “I could come home for a while,” I offered.
    “No, no. Stay at camp. Train. Do what you need to do. But you will come home for the next school year?”
    “Yeah, of course. Uh, if there’s any school that will take me.”
    “Oh, we’ll find something, dear,” my mother sighed. “Some place where they don’t know us yet.”
    As for Tyson, the campers treated him like a hero. I would’ve been happy to have him as my cabin mate forever, but that evening, as we were sitting on a sand dune overlooking the Long Island Sound, he made an announcement that completely took me by surprise.
    “Dream came from Daddy last night,” he said. “He wants me to visit.”
    I wondered if he was kidding, but Tyson really didn’t know how to kid. “Poseidon sent you a dream message?”
    Tyson nodded. “Wants me to go underwater for the rest of the summer. Learn to work at Cyclopes’ forges. He called it an inter—an intern—”
    “An internship?”
    “Yes.”
    I let that sink in. I’ll admit, I felt a little jealous. Poseidon had never invited me underwater. But then I thought, Tyson was going ? Just like that?
    “When would you leave?” I asked.
    “Now.”
    “Now. Like . . . now now?”
    “Now.”
    I stared out at the waves in the Long Island Sound. The water was glistening red in the sunset.
    “I’m happy for you, big guy,” I managed. “Seriously.”
    “Hard to leave my new brother,” he said with a tremble